The newest Brick & Tin location that Papapietro is opening today on Cahaba Road in Mountain Brook Village has all of the old-is-new-again charm of Papapietro’s downtown restaurant, and then some – with exposed brick enclosing the bakery, pressed-tin tiles adorning the dining-room, and a handsome, U-shaped bar made from reclaimed oak as the restaurant centerpiece.

Acrylic ghost chairs encircle dark-wood tables, clear schoolhouse globe pendant lights dangle from the ceilings, and the words “brick & tin,” spelled out in black letters against the white tile flooring, greet visitors as they walk through the doors.

Acrylic ghost chairs surround a square, wooden tabletop, and the words "brick & tin" are spelled out in the tile entryway to the new Brick & Tin restaurant in Mountain Brook Village. (Tamika Moore/tmoore@al.com)

“We were trying, from a design standpoint, to strike a balance between rustic and contemporary,” Papapietro says. “I call it classic contemporary, or rustic refined.”

Papapietro -- who worked alongside Birmingham chefs Frank Stitt at Highlands Bar and Grill and Chris Hastings at Hot and Hot Fish Club before opening Brick & Tin in the summer of 2010 -- partnered with architect Kyle D’Agostino and Appleseed Workshop to transform what had been the offices of Village Dermatology into a swanky, new suburban restaurant.

As happened downtown, the more layers they peeled back during the demolition, the more hidden gems they uncovered.

“We found this brick wall that we didn’t know was here,” Papapietro says as he walks into the bakery. “So it became the story of how can we use this wall? Obviously, we love the brick; it’s part of our name. So we had the idea to use this wall to enclose the bakery.”

The new restaurant also has a few extras that the downtown location does not have -- including a separate side entrance for customers to pick up to-go orders; a larger kitchen that will allow the staff to handle lunch while also prepping for dinner; and a more spacious bakery where all of the breads for both Brick & Tin locations will be baked at one site.

And, perhaps most importantly, Papapietro has added full bar service, expanded the menu, and will open for dinner six nights a week, as well as brunch on Sunday.

The downtown location is open for lunch only on Mondays through Fridays and serves dinner only on Friday nights.

“Downtown on Friday nights, we offer entrees, but the kitchen is really small and tiny, so it’s hard to pull off all the time,” Papapietro says. “So we just do it on Friday nights.

“Here, we’re basically taking that, and we are going to do it all of the time here. So you can get an entrée at lunch or dinner, anytime. We’re trying to keep the price points of the entrees in the $18 to $25 or $26 range.”

All of the breads for both the downtown and Mountain Brook locations of Brick & Tin will be baked on-site at the new restaurant. (Tamika Moore/tmoore@al.com)

Soup selections change daily and are $3 for a cup, $6 for a bowl, and $6 for a cup and a small salad.

With the exception of the entrees and the bar drinks, the menus will be the same at both Brick & Tin locations, Papapietro says.

As they do at the downtown location, diners place their orders at the counter, go to their seats, and a server delivers their meals.

“We are trying to fuse really high-quality food into that kind of fast-casual model,” Papapietro says.

Matthew Couch, who previously worked as the wine director at Hot and Hot Fish Club, is the bar manager at Brick & Tin.

“I’m excited about our cocktail program,” Papapietro says. “We are going to do kind of a farm-to-glass seasonal cocktail thing as much as we can. We probably will have six beers on draft, as many local beers as we can. We’ve got a great wine and bar manager (Couch) who is going to drive a really good wine program here, too.”